


A Colorful World

by queertyuiop



Category: SHINee
Genre: Homophobia, Homophobic Language, Internalized Homophobia, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Mental Instability, Mental Institutions, Psychological Trauma, more of an exercise in being artistic than actual quality fanfiction
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-01
Updated: 2014-10-01
Packaged: 2018-02-19 12:50:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,559
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2388818
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/queertyuiop/pseuds/queertyuiop
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p> When living in a world of white, the only person who cares will provide a way out.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

There is only so much that can be said about this room.

It is small.

It is sparse.

It is white.

Not just white walls. Everything white. White floor. White bed. White sheets. White table, white chair, white paper and white pencil. White window pane.

Through this window I can see a courtyard. In this courtyard there is a tree. The tree is not white.

It is brown, and the leaves are too. Everything brown. Brown trunk. Brown branches. Brown bench beneath its boughs. Brown stone path leading somewhere I've never been, and never will go. Even the grass is brown. Is it winter? I don't know.

Snow would make everything white, but there is no snow in the courtyard. Why, I wonder sometimes.

My clothing is white, too. White shirt. White pants. White socks. No shoes, just slippers. Those also are white.

The only non-white thing is my name. It is sewn into my shirt, and it is black. Kim Ki bum.

I am not the only one with white clothing. There are others, just as confused as I am. They all wear white. They shuffle through the hall; I hear them outside my door. There are no sounds but their feet, but I hear them. I cannot see them; my door has no window. I can not reach them; my door is locked. I can only hear them, and take note of their presence.

I am not alone. Or am I?

I feel alone, most of the time. I sit in this room day after day, waiting to be healed so I can go home. Even though I can't remember where home is any more. I sit on my white bed, or on my white chair, and I stare out my white window at the brown courtyard with its brown tree. I watch each leaf fall to the ground.

I am sometimes interrupted by my door opening. It's a nurse. She's wearing white, too. She places a cup and two pills on my table and walks out without a word. They know I won't speak.

I take the pills; I am not a difficult patient in that regard. I want to get better.

I get a meal three times during the day. Every day it is the same food, but I don't complain about that either. It isn't bad food. I eat what I can and leave the tray by the door. My plate and tray are as white as the rice served daily.

Another part of my daily routine is the doctor. He comes in once each evening to check on me. His coat is white, but his name is sewn in black like mine. Choi Min ho.

Doctor Choi has kind eyes. His eyes are brown, but they are the good kind of brown. He looks like someone's older brother, or a young uncle. He also looks athletic, and seems to always exude that air of subtle masculinity that women find irresistable. I think he knows it.

His scent--is it his cologne?--is a cross between pine needles and a musky cinnamon smell. It is intoxicating, and I find myself enraptured as he sits on the side of my bed and talks to me in that low, friendly tone. He talks as if I am his friend, and as if I will one day talk back. Maybe I will, someday.

I think the medicine isn't working. Every night I have dreams about him, and every night I dream he is taking me away from this place. We are walking on green, green grass, and we fall onto the soft earth and stare up at a blue, blue sky. It's the most beautiful thing I've ever seen, second only to those big, brown eyes.

I think I'm losing my mind. My family would be so upset; they sent me here to get help, and I am ruining it with these fantasies. It's been so long, but every time I hear that soft, gentle voice and smell that alluring scent I feel my mind reawakening to all sorts of new things. There are more colors outside than I saw before. They are there, but they were just hiding. ...I must be going crazy.

I've stopped taking my medicine. I think it was bad for me, because now I can see and hear and smell and taste so many things I couldn't while I was taking it. I only eat half my food now, because I grind up the pills into the other half so they'll think I took them. Still, every time Doctor Choi enters the room I feel like my heart is going to explode. His voice has gotten so much smoother, and I can actually pay attention to what he's saying and I feel so strong, strong enough to respond. Maybe I will, tomorrow.

Today's the day. I'm going to talk to the doctor, and I'm going to tell him everything. I don't care if he keeps me in here forever; so long as I can see him each and every day, I'll be fine. I watch him sit on the edge of the bed, and watch him open his mouth to speak--before he can, I cut him off with the softest words I've ever spoken, my first words in a long, long time.

"I love you."

Before I know it, his lips are on mine and my heart feels like it has stopped beating entirely. I gasp at the sudden contact and he pulls away, smiling. He doesn't say anything, but he seems oddly happy. He helps me out of bed and tells me to put on my slippers, then proceeds to lead me out into the hallway that I haven't seen in months, maybe longer. He leads me down a staircase and out into the courtyard, and I notice that the tree is green, and the grass is too, and that the brown path--no, red, it's brick--leads to the main gate. We walk out together and he leads me to what looks like a motorcycle. Wow, I haven't seen one of these in a long time.

"Get on," he says with that same strangely happy smile.

I do so, and he hands me a second helmet to use. He puts the key in the ignition and prepares to start the vehicle, but before he does he stops; he's remembered something, from the way his expression changes. He hops off the bike and pulls off his white coat, revealing a blue tee shirt beneath. After ripping the fabric of the coat a bit, he takes his name out of it and leaves it laying on the damp pavement. He hops on the bike again and we take off, my arms wrapping securely around his waist as I'm afraid of falling. But I've already fallen, really...I've fallen in love with this man, the doctor, Choi Minho.

"By the way, I'm a janitor," he says over his shoulder before focusing on the road again. "Well, I was until today anyway."


	2. Chapter 2

My name is Choi Minho, and my life is pretty average.

I wake up every morning before the sun, throw on some sweats and sneakers, and head outside to run. After the sun has risen, I make my way back to my apartment and clean up, making myself some instant noodles for lunch (again) and using plastic dishes so I don't have anything to clean afterward.

Yeah, I'm a pretty average guy.

I sit down at my computer and check out the latest news, especially that of my favorite sports teams...I've always loved sports, probably because my father is a coach, but I never took the opportunity to advance past the school's varsity soccer team. Oh well, life's full of those regrets, and there's no point in wishing the day away. Instead I occupy myself with my favorite games and things until it's time to get ready for work. I slip into a pair of jeans and pull on my navy blue tee shirt, hesitating before grabbing my other "uniform" and stashing it in my bag as I head out the door.

I know I shouldn't keep this up...but I have to see him.

I work evenings as a custodian at a mental hospital; a "crazy house", "loony bin", "funny farm"...I think of it as a prison. Some of the people there seem like they need to be locked up, but some are there for no reason at all. Take my secret "patient" for example...I've seen the files; I know he's here because he "exhibited signs of homosexuality" and was committed by his family for "curing". The bastards. He doesn't need to be cured of anything...he just needs love, like so many of the others in that hell hole.

Kim Kibum.

I guess you could say he's my pet project, like some kind of new and exciting adventure to give me some measure of job satisfaction I don't get from disposing of bedpans and scrubbing floors. Still, I prefer to think of him as my secret friend, someone I'm helping just because it feels right. Everything about him feels right, to be honest. He's anything but average: he's like an angel. How anyone could lock him away is beyond me...he's too perfect.

He's my drug. My obsession.

After working in this place for so long, I have come to find out a lot of things about what really goes on here. I know how they make the rooms sparse and colorless to dampen these peoples' psyches, and I know that they put depressants into the daily "medicine" to keep their more spirited patients so numbed that they can't even tell which way is up. I've heard murmured rants from several of the patients, obsessing about one thing or another. To be honest, it's creepy.

I remember his first day.

He came walking in with his head hung in shame, as so many of the new ones do, but in his eyes there was a spark of something that drew me in like a moth to a flame. He had a certain kind of spirit, one I was sure could not be broken. Then again, the drugs have a power all their own, and his eyes are now dulled like the rest.

I visit him every night.

Before I start making my rounds, but after the nurses and orderlies have retired for the evening, I slip my white coat out of my bag and use my master key to enter his room. I'm not supposed to go in unless a patient is asleep, but for him I disregard this rule (and so many others). I enter, and he smiles just softly as he looks up at me from his bed. I sit on the bed's edge and begin to talk to him, wondering if he can understand anything I'm saying as his eyes are just as glazed as ever and his lips sealed as they have been for a long while.

Still, I talk to him.

Sometimes I tell him that everything is going to be okay, and that he'll be leaving here one day. Sometimes I tell him about my life, although there's not much to say because before I met him, it was just a dull, average existence; an entire canvas coated in gray. Now, though, my evenings are spent with sparks of color spread across that same canvas, his mere presence making my heart thump a little faster and my palms sweat just slightly.

I start by getting him ready.

He may not realize it, but he already knows everything about this plan of mine. I've been telling him things late into the night, encouraging him to do things that will prepare him to leave. I've finally told him to stop taking his medicine, and how to dispose of it so the nurses won't find out. I've also told him about keeping quiet even after the medicine wears off, because soon enough we'll be leaving and then I'll be glad to listen to his voice every day for the rest of my life. It's what I hope for.

Finally, everything falls into place.

I've been preparing for this day for a long time: my goodbyes have been sent in today's mail, my letter of resignation too, and the plane tickets and necessary papers are laying on my desk. We're all ready to go: the flight is booked for the early morning, when no one will notice his absence, or mine. As I don my white coat for the last time, I can't help but smile: it's finally over, and I'm finally going to save the most precious person who has ever ventured into my life.

I walk into his room, and he's sitting there staring up at me as always, but I can see that light in his eyes again; that irresistible light that made me want him the moment I saw it is back once again. Finally, he's himself...or close enough. The real recovery will take some time, but time is something we'll have plenty of where we're going. I sit on the edge of his bed and take in a steady breath, ready to tell him that I'm ready to take him away from here.

"I love you."

...My breath isn't so steady any more. He just spoke to me. He told me he loved me. The very words, the very voice I have been dreaming about hearing for so long has finally made itself known and it's everything and more than what I thought it would be; the dreams don't do him justice. I blink once, twice, and realize that I should probably say something back, but then my lips just connect with his automatically and the only thing I can do is sigh softly in relief. Words aren't needed between us...it's the feelings that matter. The colors he has brought into my life, and apparently I into his.

After I help him get ready, I lead him out into the parking lot and to my motorcycle, another belonging I'm giving up to be with him; yet another thing that means nothing in comparison to this angel and his love. "Get on," I say with a grin stretching my face--I probably look like a weirdo--and I hop on as well. I put the key in the ignition and am about to start it up until I remember something; the coat. I get off the bike and shed the garment and my mask with it, until all that's left is me. I cut the name out of the coat and throw it to the ground, hopping back on my bike and smiling at him before we take off. His hands around my waist are all I need to reassure me that we're going to be okay, wherever life takes us. We'll have each other.

As an afterthought, I turn to him and smile as I recognize the mild confusion in his expression; I'd only told him that I worked at the hospital, not what I did. "By the way," I say softly, just loud enough to be heard over the tires against the road, "I'm a janitor. Well, I was until today anyway."

Now, I'm just yours.


End file.
